school starts tomorrow

The kids had a looooong break from school and tomorrow that's about to come to an end. Notice I didn't say summer because that doesn't exist in Belgium, at least not in Brussels. Temps. barely reached 20 celsius (70 F.) in August, and it rained at least three times/day, esp. when you needed so desperately to get out of the house!

Now I understand why everyone jumps ship in July/Aug. The weather is deplorable, the slugs grow to monsterlike proportions and consume anything they can slime onto, and nobody is here. There were times when it was a struggle to find friends for the kids to play with. Everyone was on vacation for 3-4 weeks!

We've definitely learned our lesson. Next year we'll navigate these months with much better planning and use of Stijn's hard-earned frequent flyer miles! I don't regret the summer we had (lemonade stands in the rain, cycling in the mud, creating fairy camps in our garden to make up for the friends that were all "weg", swimming on the trampoline). It's just that I don't want to repeat it, necessarily!

zeeland

I watched shorebirds in Zeeland, NL, with a Flemish bird group last weekend (Oost-Brabant Vogel Werk Groep, Natuurpunt). Imagine 12 spotting scopes set up all in a row and names of birds being called out right and left (in Dutch of course). It was incredible!

Long waves of 100's of shorebirds constantly landed in the diked wetlands and you could barely identify them fast enough before the next wave of species arrived (8 m below sea level on coast).

I've never seen so many oystercatchers, golden plovers or sandpipers before in my life - it was unbelievable. The Kluut, or Pied Avocet, was one of my favorites because of the striking plummage and stunning bill. Was fun to watch it forage.

I saw 29 "new" species but was too busy trying to keep track of them that I didn't keep a trip list. Am sure it was double that. By the end of the day, I was completely spent but satisfied. Below are my "new" birds, although some I've seen in the Americas, like the Fulvous Whistling Duck, Northern Pintail, Ruddy Turnstone, Sanderling, Whimbrel and Common Snipe. For info on this bird club: see http://www.natuurpunt.be/vogelwerkgroep-oost-brabant. One birder has a life list w 3000 species - now that's supreme!

Little Egret
Eurasian Spoonbill
Fulvous Whistling Duck
Northern Pintail
Eurasian Wigeon
Western Marsh Harrier
Hobby
Grey Partridge
Pied Avocet
Common Ringed Plover
Grey Plover
Eurasian Golden Plover
Red Knot
Sanderling
Ruddy Turnstone
Dunlin
Temminck's stint
Little stint
Wood sandpiper
Green sandpiper
Spotted redshank
Common greenshank
Bar-tailed Godwit
Eurasian Curlew
Whimbrel
Common snipe
Ruff
Lesser Black-backed Gull
Yellow Wagtail

Colibri in Durbuy?

This was the subject of a French email I received yesterday after joining a French bird discussion group. I'm learning more than I thought I would, and this is my first interesting discovery. If you know Colibri, you know it made my heart stop! It's the French name for HUMMINGBIRD!, and someone thought they saw one in Belgium (where they don't occur).

Well, the bad news is that it turns out it wasn't a hummingbird. The good news is that it was a hummingbird moth (or maybe a sphinx moth). I didn't actually see a photo so it's hard for me to decipher the species of moth due to my limited French.

At any rate, it's thrilling to discover that these beautiful winged creatures grace this bourgeois landscape. That a birder thought it was a MOTH is kinda funny, but at least I learned that there's a chance I'll see one here in the future.

Bonnes obs!

a good judge of character

Was driving Phoebe to her pony class the other day and having a talk in the car. Our best talks usually happen in the car when it's just me and her. Otherwise, she's always competing for attention. She mentioned she liked the Johnny Depp version of "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", which we'd watched the night before.

So, I asked her, "did you like Sjakie?" (the Dutch name for Charlie, since we watched the video in Dutch, which made it seem even wierder to me than it probably was). "Who was that?" she asked. "That was Charlie", I replied. "Oh", she said, "he's the one who didn't have any problems". I couldn't have said it better. Charlie may have been short on money + food, but he was long on love + respect.

We hadn't even talked about the movie up until this point, but she was able to come to this conclusion all by herself. I know kids have a sharp intuition, but sometimes we need moments like this to help us appreciate just how together are kids really are.

I loved watching this movie as a kid, but it's even better to watch it now with my own kids. It makes my heart glad to see them enjoying the silliness of it all but also learning an important lesson - like don't forget to brush + floss!

mom, it's not about THE BIRDS!

... Alex yelled as she tried to recover from a foiled attempt to pee on the side of a road. She's tried several techniques in the past, but each time she ends up getting more wet than the ground she's urinating on. (Maybe girlscouts would be a good idea after all!) At any rate, this attempt was no exception, and by the tone of her voice, I could tell she was about to crash bigtime.

I had an equally or more important task. Just as we pulled off the side of the road in Wallonia, a pair of gulls flew overhead with black backs and wings - one juvenile and one adult. Of course, I was trying to figure out if they were greater or lesser black-backed gulls (grote of kleine mantelmeeuw), and with just a few microseconds I would've had it. But no ...

"MOM, it's not about THE BIRDS - it's about ME!", and then I knew I had to abandon my mission and help my 9 year-old go potty. I should've been happy that the kids agreed to join me on a bird-chasing expedition in the first place, but I was still disappointed. We didn't see any new birds, but we did manage to find a really HOT shorebird migration stopover site (Boneffe, BE).

But therein lies a parent's dilemma: spending time w family vs. spending time doing the things that keep you sane. It's hard to find the right balance, but it's so important to keep trying. When Alex made her proclamation, little did she know that she nailed the big issue in my life!

emperor dragonfly

One Anax imperator staked out a territory in our yard, and it's the coolest dragon I've ever seen. It's huge and brilliantly colored.

I stop everything I'm doing when he shows up cuz he's so fun to watch. Kids love him too. Wish I could say I took this photo, but he never sits still long enough and I don't have the patience!

Don't fear - I promise I won't touch him, but boy would I love to have one for my collection!

hummingbird moth

Finally saw one of these guys in Europe - in southern Bohemia to be precise - on a farm with lots of pretty flowers and rolling hills. Made me think of the ruby-throated hummers that came to my feeder in Ohio every year, as well as the hummingbird moths that visited our flowers ... and how very, very much it sucks not seeing them in Belgium.

chasing birds in French

Il arrive parfois d'observer des groupes de Martinets tomber des nuages juste avant ou juste après (suivant le sens du vent par rapport au sens de la migration) de recevoir une forte pluie. Je l'ai encore observé il y a quelques jours et c'était malheureusement (pour moi) avant !Je pense qu'ils tentent de l'éviter en volant au dessus des nuages quand c'est possible et que dès qu'ils l'ont dépassée, redescendent afin d'avoir moins de vent. Du coup,s'il est impossible de l'éviter ou d'en profiter pour se nourrir, je pense qu'ils l'affrontent (tant qu'à voler, autant aller plus loin !)@+ Nico.

This is what you get when you log on to a birding discussion group in French! Est impossible!

one year to date in Belgium

Exactly a year ago we landed on Belgian soil, not having a clue what we were doing. We faced a lot of challenges with everything being new (home, friends, school, the milk!, the food!, the birds!, language, viruses, culture).

Nobody wanted to play with the kids at school, they were constantly getting sick, and schoolwork was a challenge, esp. tests in a foreign language, which Alex failed miserably at first. Friends of mine already moved away. Parents of 3 new friends died. It was one hardship after another.

To boot, I missed my friends and family something terrible (hence, the reason for this blog!), and the 6 h time difference didn't make it any easier to stay in touch. I just wanted to live on the telephone, but it never seemed to ring. But thank you, sincerely, to everyone who called.

Now, 12 months later, I can confidently say that our ship has landed. We all call this place home, even though I'll always feel like Belgians look at me like I have horns growing out of my head, which is their problem, don't you think? Dad seems more relaxed than ever, which is directly correlated with being closer to family and farther from headquarters. Mom's learning how to relax, through her birdwatching (100 EU birds), yoga, tai chi and drawing. Alex and Phoebe have become best friends wout knowing it, and Thijs is beginning to assert himself. The bottom line: life is good.

And how did we celebrate this day? After a trip to Boudewijn seapark (http://www.boudewijnseapark.be) to celebrate Alex's 9th birthday, we drove north to the coast of Belgium (Blankenberge), where we found a little hole-in-the-wall eatery in the dunes and devoured bowls of spaghetti while watching a lightening storm. When the storm cleared, we walked on the beach and played in the surf (where photo taken).

It might sound funny, but I think both Stijn and I really needed to see the coast ... and walk on the wide-open beach, feel the stiff ocean breeze, hear the crashing waves, and (for me, at least) get that last no. 100 bird! You see, although Stijn isn't a birder, he's sympathetic to my bird-watching passion. So off I marched with my binoculars (verrekijkers), and before long I saw it flying over a marshy field as I walked over the dunes -- the Blauwe Kiekendief, or Northern Harrier.

Finally, I reached my goal of 100 new EU birds. Everyone was happy. What a way to end the year.

is alex doing what i think she's doing?

Like the typical Verschuuren conversation (read on), I didn't mean to capture this relatively common but not so flattering moment on film, but unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on your perspective) that's exactly what happened.

Alex will hate me for posting this photo which may come back to haunt her, but I actually think it's a sweet, spontaneous shot of her and her cousin Marlies (both flower girls in the wedding) in Spanish dresses given to them by tante Sandra.

The two cousins were inseparable the entire evening + weekend, and it's nice to see that our move to Europe has given them some time to be silly young girls together for as long as it lasts.

the glass plate

Phoebe wasn't nervous at all about being one of the ringbearer's for Lucie's and Thomas' wedding in Carlsbad, CZ, but I became more nervous when I saw that the ring was on a very delicate glass plate. (No, they don't use pillows in Europe - nobody was familiar with that tradition, albeit more boring but also more practical.)

The chic & modern plate made for a beautiful presentation of the ring, but nevertheless, it was G-L-A-S-S, which from a mother's perspective equates with D-I-S-A-S-T-E-R. Wouldn't a silver platter do, or for that matter, something indestructible like plastic? I know it wouldn't be as elegant, but this is a barely-5 year old we're talking about, and 1 bump from an unsuspecting onlooker could send the plate (and ring) flying. My adrenaline was surging.

Luckily, Phoebe and I were able to sit in the front row, and I plopped her right on my lap, w my hands within easy reach of the plate should it manage to take a tumble. She never let loose of the plate, but she did tip it enough that the ring almost tumbled off a dozen times. When the time came for her to give Lucie the ring, I took a deep sigh of relief and could finally relax. The wedding was beautiful, spectacular really, and the food and drinks never stopped coming. The Czechs really know how to throw a party, and we're glad we didn't miss this one. Congrats. Lucie and Thomas!

Phoebe marks the spot

I have no idea how she did it, but Phoebe managed to lodge her bouquet of balloons on top of the castle tower, signalling where the wedding of Thomas & Lucie took place in Karlovy Vary, Czechie.

You see Stijn and his brother Willem having a lot of fun with this, definitely one of the funniest moments of the evening. Phoebe was the ringbearer for Lucie, and Max (in background) was the ringbearer for Thomas.

Stay tuned for more silly but wonderful stories from this unique wedding.

a typical Verschuuren conversation

Now you see what I have to put up with. In Stijn's family ... everyone talks BUT nobody listens. Even Stijn is sitting there, not paying any attention to his father, mother, brother or niece, who all appear to be talking at the same time. His sister's bent over in the background, supposedly talking to his brother Thomas, who's looking off into space.

This photo might make more sense if everyone was singing a song, or proudly saying the national anthem, but given that the Dutch frown on overt displays of patriotism, the chance of that happening is slim to nonexistent. So what was the topic of their conversation(s)? I only wish I knew.

Coincidentally, this happens to be the best family photo I was able to take of the Verschuuren family. Thus, it will serve as the OFFICIAL 2006 Verschuuren family photo.